# Lehre und Wehre_St. Louis Missouri_Januar 1859_S19
# AI translation — CHI Digital Archive (demonstration)

The History of the Doctrine of the Spiritual Office, etc.        19

—by which Christ has established the Christian order for punishing
sin, so that for this the pope's law is neither needed nor of any use. 27)

13. Not a special spirit of office, but the Holy Spirit — as he
indwells the whole believing congregation, and, as such, belongs
to believers — gives power and authority to forgive sin.

"Before Christ gave the command to forgive and to bind sin, he
breathed on them and said: Receive the Holy Spirit; whosesoever sins
ye shall forgive, they are forgiven them. Jn. 20. Here it is settled
that no one can forgive sin unless he has the Holy Spirit. — Yet
again, should I then have no forgiveness of my sin unless my
confessor had the Holy Spirit; and no one can be certain of another,
whether he has the same — when would I become certain of my
absolution, and obtain a quiet conscience? Then it would be as
before. The answer is, I have brought this up so that one might have
a right foundation for this matter. There is no doubt that no one
binds or forgives sin except only the one who has the Holy Spirit so
surely that you and I know it, as these words of Christ here convince
us. But that is no one other than the Christian church, that is, the
assembly of all believers in Christ; it alone holds these keys — of
that you should have no doubt. — Thus, if a stone or a piece of wood
could absolve me in the name of the Christian church, I would accept
it. Again, if the pope, in the name of his power, set me in the
highest choir of angels, I would stop both my ears and hold him for
the greatest blasphemer. He is a servant of the keys, like every
other priest; but the keys belong to the church alone. — Therefore
our faith is so ordered, that the article, 'the forgiveness of sins,'
must stand after the article, 'a holy Christian church,' and before
the article, 'I believe in the Holy Spirit' — so that it might be
recognized how, without the Holy Spirit, there is no holy church, and
without the holy church there is no forgiveness of sins." 28)

14. Public testimony is necessary.

"This is proven thus: because it is necessary that, since the church
or a spiritual matter cannot grow, be preserved, live, work,
overcome, endure, and do all that pertains to the church unless it is
built upon the foundation — that is, unless it has attained Christ,
who rules within it through faith, the Spirit, and the other gifts of
his Spirit — there must be such preaching in the church as rests on
him alone and on no other." 29)

15. Therefore God wills that such public testimony take place.

27) Little Book on Confession. To Fr. v. Sick. Vol. 19, 1069. 28) The
same, 1051–1053. 29) To Duke Albr. of Prussia, on the Pope and His
Power. Vol. 19, 911.